PU IJT Nazim death, FIR against principal

PU IJT Nazim shot dead
Lahore, May 14: Nazim of the Islami Jamiat Talaba (IJT) of Law College in the Punjab
University was on Sunday killed while two others were injured when three
unidentified persons opened indiscriminate fire in Muslim Town police
limits.

The deceased student was Awais Aqeel while
one of the injured was Ejaz Butt. Police have removed the body to a
morgue and started a probe. The university students got infuriated over
the incident and staged a protest demonstration against the police. The
murderers could not be identified till the filing of this report.

A
police officer said the victim Awais had a scuffle a few days back with
one Abrar Wattoo, former activist of the IJT, after which Abrar was
ousted from Hostel No 16. He added Abrar nursed a grudge against Awais
and planned to kill him.

IJT Nazim-e-Aala Zubair Safdar said it was too early to comment about the motive behind the killing.

PU staff condemn FIR against principal
Lahore: Punjab University Academic Staff Association (PUASA) has condemned
registration of an FIR against the principal of the PU College of
Information Technology (PUCIT), Dr Mansoor Sarwar, by New Anarkali
police.

PUASA executive council's emergency meeting was
held on Sunday which unanimously condemned the incident and alleged that
the SHO and the DSP concerned registered the FIR against the senior
faculty members after receiving bribe from "hooligans" of Islami Jamiat
Talaba which had damaged sanctity of the institution.

The
meeting, chaired by PUASA President Prof Amir Sarwar, observed that
instead of taking action against the IJT "hooligans" involved in
misbehaving with teachers and damaging the university property at Khalid
Bin Waleed Hostel of the varsity the police implicated a senior teacher
in the case.

It unanimously passed a resolution,
demanding the Punjab government immediately suspend the police officials
and take stern action against them. It was also announced that PUASA
general body meeting would be held on May 15 in which future plan of
action would be decided.

On the other hand, according to a
press statement, PU chapter IJT Nazim Rai Haq Nawaz while addressing a
gathering of Jamiat activists alleged that the PUCIT principal had not
only taken four Jamiat activists hostage but also tortured them owing to
which one of the students' leg was fractured. He also said Dr Mansoor
was first cousin of PU Vice Chancellor Prof Dr Mujahid Kamran and was
allegedly accommodated on various administrative posts.

When
contacted, New Anarkali SHO Syed Ahmed Raza denied the allegation,
saying that the FIR had been registered purely on merit. He said that in
fact two FIRs were registered, one against the teacher and another
against Jamiat activists. "Both the FIRs were registered on purely
merit", he added. The DSP was not available for comment.

Muhammad
Shafqat Anjum, son of Muhammad Hussain, has been awarded a PhD in
geography after approval of his thesis entitled "Spatial Patterns of
Tuberculosis in the Punjab, 1990-2005," Gulshan Majeed, daughter of
Abdul Majeed Khan, in political science after approval of her thesis
"National Integration in Pakistan: A Socio-Political Analysis of
Balochistan (1972-2005)," Muhammad Tanvir Zafar, s/o Rai Zafar Ali Khan,
in geography after approval of his thesis "Development of Industrial
Estates in the Punjab: A Spatio-Functional Analysis," Munawar Saleem
Ahmad, s/o Bashir Ahmad, in biological sciences after approval of his
thesis "Cloning and Molecular Characterisation of Cryic Gene from Local
Isolates of Bacillus Thuringiensis Having Dual Toxicity Against
Lepidopteran and Dipteran Insects," Khushi Muhammad, s/o Zafar Ali, in
biological sciences on thesis "Identification and Characterisation of
Rust Resistance Gene (s) in Commercial Cultivars of Sugarcane (Saccharum
Hybrids L.)," Muhammad Salim, s/o Muhammad Aslam, in chemistry after
approval of his thesis "Synthesis, Characterisation and Applications of
Pyridine Containing Compounds and Their Quaternary Ammonium Salts,"
Talat Iqbal, s/o Ch M Yaqub, in earth and environmental sciences after
approval of his thesis "Seismicity of Pakistan and Formulation of
Attenuation Relationship," Sumbal Zulfiqar, d/o Zulfiqar Ali, in
biological sciences after approval of her thesis "Molecular Analysis of
Gene Responsible for Copper Resistance in Bacteria Isolated from
Industrial Effluents," Sadaf Sultan, d/o Sultan Akhtar, in Islamic
Studies after approval of her thesis "Globalisation: Cultural Effects on
Muslim world," Malika Rehana, d/o M Shafi, in Urdu after approval of
her thesis "Allama Iqbal Ke Khidmat Ba Hasiat Rukn Punjab Assembly" and
Nadeem Shafique Butt, s/o M Shafique, in the subject of statistics after
approval of his thesis entitled "Development of Multivariate Estimators
in Survey Sampling and Their Application."

PU distinction
Lahore: Punjab University (PU) students have shown outstanding performance and claimed
team trophy in various competitions of the "IST Youth Carnival 2012"
organised by Institute of Space Technology Islamabad.

French courses for PU students on half fee
Lahore: Alliance Française de Lahore Director Dominique Scobry during a visit to Punjab
University (PU) Department of French announced 50 percent fee concession
for the university students opting for French courses at Alliance
Française.

According to a press statement, the purpose is
to facilitate and promote French language in Pakistan. He also conversed
with the beginner's level students of Online French and Certificate in
French language course.

The director congratulated the students on their excellent performance, creativity and skills in French language.

In
his meeting with Chairperson Dr Saleha, he expressed his interest in
developing a database for francophone alumni network. Dominique Scobry
assured his support to the department in academic and co-curricular
activities.

GCU announces affiliation policy
Lahore: In a major development Government College University (GCU) on Saturday
announced the affiliation rules and regulations for government and
private colleges interested in affiliation with the university.

GCU
Vice Chancellor Prof Dr Khaleeq-ur-Rahman said the university had set
June 30, 2012, deadline for receiving applications from the interested
colleges for affiliations to the bachelor's programme. He said the rules
and regulations had been endorsed by the university's syndicate in its
37th meeting.

While making public the affiliation rules
and regulations, Prof Khaleeq-ur-Rahman, the brain behind the
affiliation policy, claimed that the varsity would not compromise on
quality and standards while affiliating private and government
educational institutions.

He also said the affiliation
committee would inspect the institutions seeking affiliations in light
of 40 general rules and special conditions laid down in the GCU
affiliation rules and regulations and would recommend the case to the
vice chancellor and the syndicate. He said for bachelor's programme, the
affiliations would be initially granted for four years only and would
be extended on the request of the college after evaluating its
performance.

He said the affiliated colleges shall have to
observe academic calendar of the GC University, Lahore and they would
also follow the evaluation, examination and attendance system prescribed
by the university. Keeping in view its strong traditions of supporting
deserving students, GCU would make bound the colleges to provide full
fee concession to at least five per cent and half fee concession to at
least five per cent of the enrolled students.

The
affiliation rules state that the desirable student-teacher ratio should
be 20 to 1 and at least 60 per cent of the staff should be full-time
qualified teachers as prescribed by the university. There shall be a
librarian in affiliated college with master's degree in the relevant
subject and sufficient library staff and books to facilitate the
students. Initially books worth not less than Rs 300,000 shall be
purchased for the library of the affiliated college. Thereafter at least
Rs 100,000 shall be allocated annually for acquisition of
books/journals/magazine etc for the library. In case of an IT college,
the computer laboratory facilities for 50 per cent of the students
admitted at a time should be provided while at least six full-time
teachers should have the qualifications as prescribed by the university
consisting of at least three MCS or equivalent degree holders.

The
GCU VC said the conditions laid down in the GCU affiliation rules and
regulations would be fully implemented to ensure production of quality
human resource from the affiliated colleges of this great institution
having rich traditions and great record of excellence.

Talking
about the GCU affiliation committee, he said the committee comprising a
chairperson nominated by the Syndicate, two professors nominated by the
academic council, two teachers nominated by the syndicate and the
executive district officer (Education), Lahore, would ensure that all
affiliated colleges shall fulfill all the requirements and conditions
laid down in the GCU affiliation rules and regulations.

Prof
Khaleeq said the institutions located outside Punjab could also apply
for affiliations with the permission from their respective government or
university.

College teachers' capacity building, training being ignored
Lahore: Over the years, the Punjab government has been ignoring a much-needed
initiative of organizing capacity building and training programme for
college teachers of the province.

Though there is a
separate entity, Directorate of Staff Development (DSD), for the
government schoolteachers, there is no such organization in place which
caters to the training needs of the college cadre teachers serving at
public colleges across the province.

Interestingly, the
Punjab government allocated funds in various budgets for the purpose of
providing training to college teachers but later the schemes were either
dropped or not executed for reasons best known to the officials
involved.

This year too, the Higher Education Department
Punjab has included teachers training programme as one of its proposed
development schemes in the upcoming budget. However, it is yet unclear
whether the same would be executed or dropped like the previous years.
Undoubtedly, there has always been need of well trained and
professionally sound teachers keeping in view emerging trends in
education but the Punjab government's indifferent attitude in this
regard speaks volumes for its failure to address this significant
aspect.

A couple of years ago, the Punjab government
launched 4-year BS (Hons) programmes in various disciplines at 26
selected colleges of the province. In an ideal situation the government
should have ensured proper training of teachers involved in this new
academic programme to make the initiative a success but to no avail.

Resultantly,
the BS (Hons) programme failed to receive proper response from students
and the number of students continued to drop. The non-provision of
proper training to the teachers is also cited to be one of the reasons
for increasing drop out rate at the 26 selected colleges.

Stakeholders
argue that since the college teachers were not trained and not provided
the required skills to continue with BS (Hons) programmes like the
university teachers the result is discouraging.

According
to them provided the teachers had revamped their pedagogical views
while going through regular and relevant training programmes the
situation might have been different today.

Prof Atif, a
representative of Punjab Professors & Lecturers Association (PPLA),
laments over absence of training programmes for the college cadre
teachers saying the teachers have also little opportunities to improve
their qualifications. He believes together with proper training and
higher qualifications, the college cadre teachers can produce better
results.

According to him, college teachers having MA/MSc
qualifications with second division were denied admission to MPhil and
PhD programmes at universities terming the same saying "This is main
hurdle if teachers want to improve their qualifications." PPLA
representative also lamented over fewer scholarship opportunities saying
unlike university teachers the college teachers were neither encouraged
nor facilitated for foreign scholarship programmes. The stakeholders
and academic circles have demanded the Punjab government to avoid its
indifferent attitude this time and provide proper opportunities to
college teachers for their capacity building as the same is going to
help the students in the end. The news